Free tool
Emergency Cooking Fuel Calculator
Estimate how long your propane will last if you cook the regular way, and how much longer it lasts if you boil briefly and let an insulated cooker finish the job. It's free, needs no account, and nothing you type is saved or sent anywhere. Learn the method in Cooking Without Constant Heat.
The small green camping bottles
Standard barbecue tanks
Check your stove. Many camp burners are 7,500–10,000
Count each pot you cook, not each person
Boiling plus simmering until done
Just long enough to boil, then insulate
Your estimate
Total propane: 24 lbs
Regular cooking
35 days
Thermal cooking
156 days
Extra days gained
121
How this is figured
One pound of propane holds about 21,600 BTU of energy. The calculator divides your total energy by what your burner uses each day (burner size × minutes per meal × meals per day). Real results run shorter in cold weather, wind, and at high altitude, and when burners run on high, so treat this as a best-case estimate and practice to find your own numbers.
Use propane, butane and camp stoves outdoors only, unless the stove is specifically rated for indoor use. Build your own insulated cooker with How to Build and Test a Homemade Insulated Cooker.